Law&Crime Sidebar - Disheveled D4vd's Messy Appearance Stuns Courtroom

Episode Date: June 17, 2026

David Anthony Burke, the singer better known as D4vd, appeared in court Wednesday for a status conference ahead of his preliminary hearing. D4vd is accused of killing 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, who he was allegedly in an illegal sexual relationship with. But as his prelim continues to be pushed back, the singer appears to be slowly deteriorating behind bars. Law&Crime's Jesse Weber got all the details from inside the courtroom from reporter Julia Deng.HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea, Alex Ciccarone, & Jay CruzScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrimeTwitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Acused child murderer David was back in court today for a status conference. A key meeting before a major reported multi-day preliminary hearing that was supposed to happen in two weeks. Although what happened today? What happened in court? What did we learn? What can we expect from the prosecution and the defense? And also, how did the romantic homicide singer look and act? Breaking it all down with a reporter who was inside that courtroom. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by law and crime. I'm Jesse Weber. All right, we just had a new hearing in the David case, just wrapped up this status conference.

The sides coming together with the judge determining where we're at in the case, what's going to happen. Now, I'm going to give you a little preview. We were supposed to have a preliminary hearing on June 29th, and it's reportedly going to be a few days. This is when the prosecution will present the evidence that they have. Maybe not all the evidence, but enough evidence to say, hey, judge, there's sufficient probable cause to support the charges.

and for this case to go to trial, that's what a preliminary hearing is. The defense has an opportunity to challenge the evidence. Now, I say that, but you're going to hear how the timeline got a little tricky today based on what happened in court. Now, David is currently charged with first-degree murder, continuous sexual abuse of a child under 14, and unlawful mutilation of human remains, all in connection with the death of 14-year-old Celeste Rivas Hernandez. Remember back in September 8, 2025, that was the day after what would have been Celeste 15th birthday. Her dismembered, decomposed body is found reportedly in the front trunk of a Tesla, allegedly registered to David at an L.A. tow yard. At the tow yard, LAPD detectives apparently opened the Tesla's front storage compartment and found a black cadaver bag that was covered with insects. Inside the bag, they reportedly discovered a severely decomposed head and torso. There was a plastic garbage bag.

beneath the black cadaver bag that reportedly contained the dismembered arms and legs. Now, it was also reported that Celeste's ring and pinking fingers on her left hand had been amputated, that they were not found in this car. But prosecutors allege that David was in this illegal sexual relationship with Celeste that he lured her to his rental home out in L.A. on April 23rd and stabbed her to death. Allegedly watched her bleed out and then reportedly took horrible. measures to conceal this alleged crime. They claim that he allegedly purchased a blue inflatable pool, chainsaws a body bag, heavy-duty laundry bags, that he dismembered her body. They claim that he made

suspicious trips out to the Santa Barbara County area, that he allegedly lied to friends and associates about the smell of purported decomposition in his place. And we know that on April 16th, 2026, he was arrested. When you go to the criminal complaint, it also includes these special circumstance allegations, murder of a witness, murder for financial gain, lying in wait, as well as a special allegation that he personally used a deadly and dangerous weapon, a sharp instrument to commit the crime. So the prosecutors alleged that he killed Celeste to prevent her from coming forward, seemingly about their relationship, which would have cost him his career, to silence her. That is what makes this a capital murder case, those special

circumstances allegations. So the death penalty is potentially on the table, but we also know that there hasn't been an execution in California for years. There's a moratorium on executions. Quick snapshot of the background. Now I want to talk about what happened today. All right, summer's here, which means it's time to change up the wardrobe for the nice weather. For me, that is about quality over quantity and everyday basics that have that elevated feel that won't break the budget. That's why I got to tell you about quince. Okay, quince makes beautiful, effortless pieces using premium materials like 100% European linen and soft organic cotton. And the value is unbelievable. Everything at quince.

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365-day returns. Okay, so let me bring on somebody who was in that courtroom today. She's outside the courthouse right now, NBCLA reporter Julia Dang. Julia, thanks so much for coming back here on Sidebar. Before we get him into the substantive issues about what happened today, I understand it was a quick hearing, but important nonetheless. How did David look? How did he look compared to the last time you saw him? I'm so glad, Jesse, you opened with that question because that was actually the first thing I texted your producers. It was the first thing I noticed. He did not look great. I mean, he came in clean shape in. It looks like he may have gotten that haircut. His attorneys requested, but he didn't look good.

He looks like he hasn't slept properly. In days, he's got bags under his eyes. He looked kind of rumpled. He was wearing the regulation orange jail uniform he had on last time, but the white undershirt this time, it was just really disheveled. Here's a thing, though. This is David, we're talking about. He is so comfortable in front of cameras, in front of people on stages.

He came in, he sat down in front of the judge, like he owned that courtroom, and he started nodding and smiling at people. He didn't speak much. He just said, yes, your honor, to acknowledge her questions when she asked if he was okay with essentially delaying this case further. But he was very engaged, very active, making eye contact with the judge nodding and smiling throughout, and this really caught my attention. Near the end of this very short hearing, really the court proceedings only went on for

about four minutes. We caught David and his defense attorney smiling at each other. This really appears to be part of the defense strategy to just keep on delaying. So he may have gotten out of this hearing today feeling like they notched some kind of win before this even goes to. And I want to talk about that. Just to set the scene a little bit, right, context of where you were. Was there anybody there for David? Was there family there? Were there friends there? Were there any known associates there? Was there anybody from Celeste's family there? I mean, what was the scene like in the courtroom? Not that I'm aware of. I did not see anyone sitting in the courtroom this morning who was easily identifiable as friends, families, or supporters of either the defendant or his alleged victim.

But the back two rows were completely filled. Those first seats set aside for us, journalists covering this case. And then ahead of us, I think about one and a half to two rows, were filled. And those were spectators. I spoke with a couple of them. Just people from around L.A. who had been interested in this case, who had been following it. Nobody was really taking a side.

No one said anything about being personally connected to either David or Celeste. So no, we didn't see family. but David was definitely just holding court on his own. Again, walking out at this hearing, smiling. Again, before we go into what happened today, for people who don't know when you talk about the condition, right, when you talk about the way David looks, where has he been?

Like, what are the conditions that he's living in right now? Because he's locked up. I mean, he is in the county jail. He is behind bars. Everybody there is now aware of what he has been charged with. It's not just first-degree murder. It's first-degree murder on top of continuous sexual abuse of a child under the age of 14. And then on top of that, after he's accused of stabbing Celeste to death at abusing her sexually,

he's accused of mutilating her corpse. So just imagine what other inmates must feel. feel about having a neighbor like that. I know rumors have been floating around online about the nature of his imprisonment right now. He did have bail denied, so he's not going anywhere anytime soon, but I can only imagine what those daily conditions are like. He's allowed to shower reportedly once every other day. He's allowed to make phone calls only on those days. So this is somebody who had celebrity status. He had a following of several million.

He had a multi-million dollar career in the works. He had sponsorship deals. He was touring. He had an album coming out. And now he's wearing this orange jumpsuit. He is behind bars. And he is probably up against behavior that has him staying up every night.

And that's why he came in today, looking like he has not slept in days. I wish we could have to be. cameras in there because it wasn't just his demeanor that captured my attention. It was his face. This is not the same David. We saw in his mugshots, in his promotional photos on tour. This is a very different David Anthony Burke now possibly about to stand trial for first degree. And look, yeah, like you said, he's facing serious charges. We have a sense sort of what the evidence is from the prosecution. We were hoping to get a better sense for a preliminary hearing that was supposed to

happen in two weeks. But I'm going to throw, I'm going to give you the floor right now. You're in this courtroom. You're at this status conference. It's supposed to be like, where are we at in the case? What exactly happened today? It got delayed again. In a nutshell, Jesse, it got pushed back yet again because the defense wants to keep on delaying. So I love coming on your podcast. But We're going to have to do this again in July after we just did this in May. So the status conference is one part of the preliminary hearing process here in California. So we just did this May 12th. It was supposed to be a preliminary hearing, May 26th.

That ended up getting moved. So then it was status conference today, June 17th, preliminary hearing, June 29th. Now that date, the 29th of June, that's been canceled. We're going to do another status conference July 7th now, and then there's supposed to be a preliminary hearing on July 21st. But I would not be surprised at this point if this gets continued or delayed again. And Julia, why did that happen, right? It has something to do with the evidence in this case, the amount of evidence. I understand there was a closed door hearing as well.

I mean, do you have any sense about what the delay is about? Yeah, that is exactly right. So they started the court proceedings a little bit late today. The entire thing went on for four minutes. But the judge sat down and immediately told all of us that there was actually a closed door in chambers hearing this morning ahead of the scheduled status conference. So she met with both sides. She met with the prosecution and the defense. And apparently, defense made a motion to continue or delay the preliminary hearing.

hearing. Now the judge indicated it was because of some kind of evidence that came out during the discovery process. She says, the judge says, the court decided there were grounds to continue this case to delay it to July. But beyond that, we don't actually know what exactly in the evidence led to this. I imagine it might have something to do with just the amount of data. We talked about that last time, how the prosecution started uploading evidence from hard drive seized during the investigation. And days later, they were only about 10% through that upload process. What we were hearing was it was 40 plus terabytes of data. And that does include video evidence, photos of Celeste and the defendant. So I imagine just the volume.

of data that still has to be sifted through has something to do with the defense calling for this delay and the prosecution agreeing. And look, what's difficult about it is we don't know what the defense is going to do. We don't know if their defense is going to challenge the timeline. We don't know if the defense is going to challenge the cause of death. But, you know, there is a question of how much they're going to fight the allegations of this sexual abuse material, allegedly found on his devices. And, you know, maybe they need more time to, you know, to form an argument. They mean more time to prepare because in a preliminary hearing, like we've talked about before, this case had gone to grand juries where it's one-sided. It's only the prosecution

presenting evidence. No indictment was returned through that grand jury. So there was questions about why that was. But now it goes to a preliminary hearing in front of a judge. The defense has an opportunity to challenge this evidence, to hear what the prosecution has and to challenge it, see where the prosecution is going with their case. But we don't know how the defense is going to do it. And so, going back to what you mentioned, whether or not this is an advantage for the defense. As somebody who's been covering this case for quite some time, I want to read you real quick what Steve Fisher posted on X today after this hearing. So Steve Fisher is a private investigator who's been looking into this case. He was hired by the owner of the property where David had reportedly been staying,

a property that's reportedly near where that Tesla was recovered with obviously Celeste Badi allegedly found inside. So he wrote today, the preliminary hearing in the David case has been continued until July 21st. He is presumed innocent in the eyes of the law, but as a human being with a brain and the ability to think and perceive, I have to say this. This is not how I would expect an innocent person to direct his lawyers to act. If I were innocent and had been sitting in jail for months on charges I did not commit, I would be telling my very high-priced lawyers, no more delays, get me the bleep out of here, but that is not what is happening. Now, Julia, look, from a legal point of view, I'll just give my two cents. Look, I get what he's saying, right? If the prosecution,

if he's really innocent, then you would assume that the prosecution's evidence against him is really weak, put their feet to the fire, have an immediate preliminary hearing, which is kind of what I think the defense initially wanted, will challenge the evidence, we'll get him out, that'll be that. But the other way of looking at it is, you know, you got to prepare a proper legal argument, and you need time to look at what the prosecution's evidence is. So how do you see it whether or not this delay is actually an advantage to David and his defense team? I think there is so much evidence against the defendant here, Jesse. I don't really know if there's any kind of advantage for his case.

I hate to let what's happening in the court of public opinion, you know, leak into what's actually happening in the court room, but it is an undeniable fact that there is overwhelming evidence against David Anthony Burke here. Otherwise, prosecutors would not have brought this case. Now, there are questions as to why there was no grand jury indictment, but we have seen the nine-page preliminary brief now, the charging document, if you will, laying out what the prosecution's side of this is going to look and sound like. in courts. I mean, even some of that material that can't be presented to the court, you know, they've described what that is, and that's part of that 40 plus terabyte volume of data that

was dumped during discovery on the defense. Now, from the attorney's standpoint, I understand the more time they have, right, the more options they can consider, the more research they can do. From David's standpoint, from the defendant standpoint, he's the one sitting in jail. I don't know how much longer he really wants to be there. Again, he did not look good this morning. He clearly has not been sleeping well behind bars. So his attorneys, his team probably sold this to him hard. You know, the more time we have, the more we can look into this, this and this, and build a strong case for you because he's not just facing one felony charge. This is not just a murder case. He's accused of three separate felonies. One of those felonies has special circumstances

that make him eligible for the death penalty, even though executions had been halted here in the state of California since 2019. It is still legal for the death penalty to be a sentence considered by prosecutors. So there's still a question mark as to whether the prosecution is going to go down that route. But serious case here, I imagine they just want more time to figure out what in the world they're going to do to fight this. And look, there is a moratorium on executions, although I will tell you this, this is what I want to really ask you about, because we knew that this wasn't the preliminary hearing today. We knew we weren't going to maybe find out all the evidence. But I was hoping we would get a preview. I was hoping we get an idea of what we can

expect at the preliminary hearing because this is a case that has been shrouded in secrecy since September of last year. We're looking for bits and pieces of information and evidence. So when this preliminary hearing potentially happens, whether it's in July or it's pushed off, what are you looking out for? Are you going to be saying, you know what, Jesse, I really want to see the actual substance, the actual content of the text messages between Celeste and David, not just the descriptions of them by prosecutors. I want to know more of the explanation of that Santa Barbara trip. Jesse, I want to see the surveillance video of David allegedly driving the Tesla.

How about this? How exactly are prosecutors going to prove that they know that he watched her bleed out in his home? There's their surveillance. Is there an eyewitness? What about the DNA and the forensics? You know, there's a part in one of the prosecution's filings where they say, inside the garage, detectives discovered evidence consistent with the dismemberment of the victim's body

in the inflatable pool, which contained multiple linear cuts, several biological samples, which tested positive for blood, were collected within the garage area. DNA analysis determined that various samples matched the victim's unique genetic profile. So what are you looking out for? What do you want to see in this case? I'm looking for all of that, Jesse. And in addition, I'm curious about who the prosecution is going to call as a witness. Now, the DA brought that up this morning. The prosecution brought that up this morning. They said they had to check with detectives.

They had to check with their witnesses before agreeing to a status conference timeline. They did eventually settle on that July 7th date. But yeah, I'm curious about all of that because the wording in that preliminary brief is so interesting. Prosecutors state so much of that as facts, which obviously raises the question, well, how do you know? How do you know the defendant stood by and watched his victim bleed out? I mean, two options come to mind immediately for me. Either there was a witness who is claiming that or there must be surveillance video.

And yes, absolutely. I am curious about the text message exchanges between, David and Celeste. We have all read now the descriptions of those tax messages, how some of them have made reference to things like plan B, abortion, pregnancy, sexual activity between the two. We have not actually read those messages. I'm also curious about the final argument the two of them had, the one that went on before David allegedly ordered an Uber that brought Celeste from her family's home in like Elsinore more than 80 miles away to his rental home in the Hollywood Hills before her phone went dead and she went missing. So there's so much of that evidence that sounds like it was

preserved on devices. In addition, right, we've talked about the chainsaws that David ordered from Amazon that were sent to his address. I'm curious about all of those things that have been referenced now, when do we get more information about where this is going and who is going to take the stand as a witness to add color, to add dimension? Yeah, and look, a couple of things there, right? So in a preliminary hearing, you would imagine it's not all the prosecution's evidence that they have. And sure, they get more evidence as they go to trial, but it usually be like the lead detective

to kind of summarize everything that they have. But also, you have to think about this, right? the conversation that David allegedly had with Celeste to allegedly lure her there, that goes not only to the idea of motive, that goes to the special circumstances, lying in wait, killing a witness for financial gain. She had to have said, I'm going to ruin your career, I'm going to go to the authorities, I'm going to expose you. So what are those messages exactly say? But also, before I let you go, Julia, cooperating witnesses. I don't know if there's anybody from David's inner circle who is going to testify against them, anybody who may have

had a role who may have aided, who may have abetted, who may have facilitated, anybody who may have assisted him in any way based on the allegations that he's facing. We haven't heard that he's had any help, but one of the things we have wondered, is there an immunity deal? Is there anybody a cooperating witness who will testify against him? Have you heard anything to indicate that whatsoever as we now wait for the next part of this case? I had not heard anything about an deal, Jesse, but it's what we haven't heard that raises more questions. People in David's inner circle. People who've been shown in photos with him at concerts, in his live stream videos, who've been on his social media, many of them are now very tight lips and making moves to distance

themselves from David. That tells me they're not supporting him. And it wouldn't shock me at this point if any one of them struck some kind of immunity deal with prosecutors. to share what they know. Now, I do want to point out that David has a brother who allegedly met Celeste when she traveled with him out of state, out of California. Sounds like she went to Texas to meet his family. David has a little brother. So very curious if he ends up on the prosecution's witness list, and of course what he has to say about his family member. Yeah. Julia, thank you so much for being our eyes and ears about what's happening in the courtroom. I mean, I could go day and night about how much I think it's a problem not to have

cameras in every courtroom in this country. I think they should be everywhere, but I really appreciate the absolutely fantastic reporting. And I'm sure we're going to be having this conversation again in July. You know, hopefully we'll have a status conference. Hopefully we'll have a preliminary hearing because as much as the public and we are looking for answers, it's really the family. It's Celeste family that deserves answers. They deserve to know what's going on here. And hopefully they get those answers sooner rather than later. Julie Dang, thank you so much for taking the time. Really appreciate it.

Thank you. And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us. And as always, please subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you should get your podcast. You can also check us out on NBC's Peacock as well. If you want to follow me, X, Instagram, my News Nation show, Jesse Weber Live, Monday through Friday, 11 p.m. Eastern.

I'll see you next time, everybody.